We're With the Band: the Thermals

Catching up with the Portland, Oregon, trio

"Now that our vision is strong, we don't have to admit we were wrong," proclaims lead singer Hutch Harris on the buoyant anthem "Now We Can See," the title track on the Thermals' fourth record. A thematic departure from 2006's The Body, the Blood, the Machine, a concept album that imagined a fascist state run by religious fanatics, their latest outing marks the band's first release with a new label (Kill Rock Stars) and a new drummer (Westin Glass). We talked to bassist Kathy Foster before catching the pop-punk three-piece at one of their sold-out New York City shows (in which they offered spot-on covers of early '90s classics by Nirvana and the Breeders for the encore) this past weekend.

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How have your lyrics evolved since your first album, More Parts per Million?
I think we've done different things lyrically on every album. For the latest, we wanted to get back to how the lyrics were on the first record and sing about classic topics—death and life and love. The last album was a lot more political and religious, but we wanted to get away from that a little.

What's the meaning behind the album's title, Now We Can See?
We thought it was a good all-encompassing title. It says what the theme of the record is, which is reflection—now we can see all the mistakes we're making on this planet, as humanity, and in our own lives. And so it's kind of a question—now that we can see all this, what are we going to do about it? And it can be interpreted in different ways.

What are the biggest nonmusical influences on the album?
Well, when Hutch and I were writing the songs, we went to the Oregon coast twice, for two weeks at a time, and rented a house and brought a bunch of gear and recorded demos and wrote songs. Being near the ocean had a lot of influence—there was a lot on the songs about land and water and reflecting. And wanting to evolve back into a fish and stepping into the ocean.

How would you characterize your sound in terms of genre?
On our first bio, Hutch described us as a combination of the grunge bands and the low-fi bands. Now we've been getting away from that a little, writing cleaner pop songs.

You recently switched labels, from Sub Pop to Kill Rock Stars. What was the impetus behind the move?
We had put out three records on Sub Pop, which is what was in our contract. Sub Pop wanted to keep working with us, but we just decided that we wanted a different kind of contract. We had a lot of creative control and loved working with them, but it came to the point where we wanted to own our own masters. And we just wanted to make the record the way we wanted it to be, without a label in mind. When we were done, Kill Rock Stars approached us really early on, and they were enthusiastic about working with us and were pretty aggressive about keeping in touch. We talked to a lot of other great labels, like Saddle Creek and Merge, but we loved everything they had to say about how they run their label.

Alicia J.Rose

Any other KRS bands you really want to collaborate with?
We're on tour with Shaky Hands, who are also on Kill Rock Stars. And a lot of the active bands on KRS too—like Panther and Horse Feathers and Explode into Colors—are in Portland.

How would you describe the Portland music scene these days ?
It's really saturated with different kinds of music, and people really celebrate it—we have a lot of good festivals. There are a lot of really good smaller bands and bigger bands that work here. It's just a really thriving, enriched music scene.

What has new drummer Westin Glass brought to the group?
He has a great attitude—really positive and fun to be around. He instantly became an equal in the band, and we've been writing songs with him.

What other bands are you currently listening to? Walkmen, Grizzly Bear, the Handsome Firs.

You have a T-shirt company—how's that going?
I have a little company called Daydream Factory, though I haven't done too much with it the past couple years. My site is still up, and there are shirts for sale, but lately I've working more on making art. I make paper collages and I scan them and create digital prints and sell them as cards on buyolympia.com.

I hear you went to school for fashion design, at San Francisco's FIDM. How would you describe your style?
I like to be casual and comfortable but cute. I like bright colors. I have a huge collection of vintage sweaters. I love fitted jeans. I love to be in style, but I like a lot of vintage stuff.

I hear you guys are fans of Larry David—are you going to see Whatever Works?
Hell yeah. Woody Allen and Larry David together? I'm so excited!